


It's A Love Story (Baby Just Say Yes)

by darkdropout



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Busking, M/M, Mentions of Taylor Swift
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-12
Updated: 2015-10-12
Packaged: 2018-04-26 01:57:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4985599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkdropout/pseuds/darkdropout
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nino is a busker who only plays Taylor Swift songs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's A Love Story (Baby Just Say Yes)

Sho sends the mail right as Ohno arrives at soba shop just inside the station.  
  
He’s cancelling – another one of his last minute schedule changes that have seemed to happen more and more often in the past few years as Sho has risen up the ranks of his company.  Ohno is proud of him for becoming such an important guy, but at the same time it’s made it kind of a hassle to be friends with him. If Sho wasn’t Sho, Ohno would have given up a long time ago and let them drift apart. But Sho is Sho, so Ohno replies back with a “no worries” and a thumbs up emoji followed by four sweaty hearts. He hits send, then shoves his phone back into his coat pocket and walks into the shop alone.  
  
Ohno doesn’t usually come to this part of this city, but Sho had insisted that this was a hidden gem of a restaurant that must not be missed. Ohno isn’t quite as invested in food as Sho. In his experience, pretty much all food is delicious. But he was willing to go out of his way to make Sho happy – a happy Sho, stuffing his face with noodles, was the best kind of Sho after all.  
  
He takes a seat in the front of the shop where a row of stools are tucked against a window facing counter, looking out over the rest of the station. He orders the shop specialty, like Sho had instructed in his cancellation message, and settles down to wait for his meal to arrive.  
  
That’s when he finally notices that there’s a busker crouched on the station floor directly opposite to the shop. Ohno must have walked right by him on his way in. He’s holding a beat-up acoustic guitar, and if Ohno strains his ears, he can make out the sound of it through the glass between them. There’s sound coming out of the busker’s mouth too, so he’s probably singing, but whatever it is all Ohno can hear is gibberish.  
  
_Romeo, take me somewhere we can be alone_  
_I'll be waiting; all that's left to do is run_  
_You'll be the prince and I'll be the princess_  
_It's a love story, baby, just say, "Yes”_  
  
When his meal arrives, Ohno is still listening, maybe even a little entranced. He slurps his soba without really tasting it, watching intently as the busker continues to play. The guy is young looking, but Ohno has himself been accused of being baby-faced for too many years to think that’s much to go on. He has dark hair, and dark eyes, and a cute little nose. He’s wearing a baseball cap with the logo of some baseball team that Ohno should recognize, but never does. There’s a facemask hooked to his ears and tucked under his chin while he sings.  He’s got a mole on his chin. He has a nice voice, even if Ohno still can’t understand a word he’s saying.  
  
It’s kind of relaxing, just to listen to him, the confident strum of his strings and clear melody of his voice. It’s kind of nice.  
  
Ohno likes it.  
  
Maybe this place was a hidden gem after all.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
For the rest of the day, Ohno can’t get the busker’s song out of his head. He’s been humming it all afternoon.  
  
“I didn’t know you liked Taylor Swift,” says Matsujun skeptically, stopping by Ohno’s desk on the way back from the photocopier.  
  
Ohno turns to look behind him and it’s only when no one is there that he realizes that Matsujun is speaking to him. He turns back. “Who?” he asks.  
  
Matsujun raises an eyebrow. “The song you’re humming. It’s a Taylor Swift song.”  
  
Ohno nods slowly as if he understands anything that Matsujun is saying. “Who?” he says again.  
  
Matsujun sighs. He puts down his photocopies and leans over Ohno to get to his computer, clicking open the Internet browser.  
  
  
  
  
  
The next day, Ohno takes his lunch break in the same shop. It’s nowhere near his office, and trying to get there and back within a time limit is only an inconvenience for him. But it’s worth the trouble when he finds the same busker crouched across from the shop entrance, strumming his guitar – just as Ohno had hoped.  
  
_Hey Stephen, I could give you fifty reasons_  
_Why I should be the one you choose_  
_All those other girls, well they're beautiful_  
_But would they write a song for you?_  
  
Ohno takes a seat at the window again, where he can listen. It’s a different song today that he can’t understand the words to, but now he’s pretty sure it’s just because it’s in English. The busker’s wearing the same baseball cap, only it’s backwards, his bangs sticking out from underneath in an endearing tuft. He doesn’t have a facemask.  
  
Today, Ohno notices that most of the time he sings with his eyes closed.  He also notices the open guitar case sitting on the floor in front of him, with a few coins thrown into it.  
  
Ohno is already eating as the song finishes, but he’s still watching, sort of mesmerized. Which means he doesn’t miss it when the busker opens his eyes and looks across the station, looks right at Ohno, sitting in the shop window. It’s a significant distance, but there’s no doubting it – the busker looks straight into his eyes, and winks.  
  
Ohno chokes on his noodles, coughing loudly enough to have the waitress hurrying over with a glass of water. When he finally recovers himself, bowing low with embarrassment to the shop owner and the other customers, he turns back to the window.  
  
The busker isn’t looking anymore. He’s already started to play another song.  
  
_You're on the phone with your girlfriend_  
_She's upset, she's going off about something that you said_  
_'Cause she doesn't get your humor like I do_  
  
  
  
  
  
When Ohno gets back to the office, he walks straight past his desk to Matsujun’s.  
  
“Is this Taylor Swift too?” Ohno asks and starts to hum.  
  
  
  
  
  
Ohno goes to the CD shop on the way home. There are a lot of Taylor Swift albums, more than he thought there would be. Matsujun had told him the name of the songs he’d heard today and the day before, but Ohno can’t read the English on any of the track listings so he buys one of each, going by the colors on the album covers to tell them apart.  
  
  
  
  
  
“It’s kind of rude you know.”  
  
Ohno stops in the shop doorway, the curtains closing back over his face for a moment, before he brushes them away.  
  
The busker is staring at him from his usual spot across the station corridor.  
  
“It’s rude,” the busker says again.  
  
Ohno stares back blankly. Then someone is pushing out of the door behind him and he’s shoved awkwardly forward into the middle of the passage, then further by the rushing commuter crowd, until he’s right in from of the busker and his beat-up guitar.  
  
“Huh?” says Ohno, not sure how he ended up here without any of his own volition.  
  
The busker kicks at his open guitar case with the toe of his sneaker, making the coins inside it jingle just a little.  
  
“You come to listen to me every day this week and you never leave a tip,” he says when Ohno doesn’t seem to get it, but he looks amused, probably at the dumb look that must be on Ohno’s face.  
  
“You only sing Taylor Swift,” is all Ohno can think of to say.  
  
The corner of the busker’s mouth quirks upwards. “You a fan?”  
  
“I bought her albums,” says Ohno. “One of each color.”  
  
It’s a full smile on the busker’s face now, complete with teeth and pink gums. “Wow,” he says.  
  
Ohno stands there awkwardly for a long moment, neither of them speaking. The busker is still grinning and Ohno kind of feels like grinning too, even if he has no reason too.  
  
He’s opening his mouth to say something, though he has no idea what, when his phone begins to ring loud and shrill in his pocket.  
  
_Cause the players gonna play, play, play, And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate,_ his phone sings.  
  
“Wow, you really are a fan,” says the busker with delight as Ohno fumbles for the phone, trying to ignore the passersby giving him strange looks. Matsujun had showed him how to download the ringtone yesterday, but Ohno hadn’t meant to set it as his default.  
  
It’s a call from the office so he has to answer it.  
  
“This is Ohno,” he mumbles, glancing down at his watch as he does so, heart leaping when he sees how late it’s gotten. He should have been on the train ten minutes ago.  “Oh, hi Aiba-chan.”  
  
He sets off briskly towards the ticket gates as Aiba beings to babble excitedly into his ear about the release of the new project details. He only gets a few steps before someone’s calling after him. He turns back to look.  
  
It’s the busker, still grinning from ear to ear.  
  
“You can make it up to me tomorrow, Ohno-san!” he says, then starts to strum his guitar again.  
  
Ohno is just swiping his PASMO card when he hears that familiar voice carrying through the station. This time, he can’t stop himself from grinning too.  
  
_I stay up too late_  
_Got nothing in my brain_  
_That's what people say_  
_Mm mm_  
_That’s what people say_  
  
  
  
  
  
Ohno waffles for most of the morning about whether or not to go back to the station.  
  
“What’s your deal?” Matsujun finally asks.  
  
It’s ten minutes before lunch and Ohno has been staring at the clock for the past twenty, a song from the album with the purple dress on the cover stuck in his head on repeat the entire time.  
  
“Nothing,” says Ohno.  
  
“You’ve been humming ‘The Story of Us’ all morning,” says Mastujun accusingly. “I thought I told you to listen to _1989_? It’s a much more mature album. You can really tell she’s grown as an artist.”  
  
“Is that the one with numbers on the front?” Ohno asks and Matsujun rolls his eyes, but in a way that doesn’t quite hide the affectionate look on his face.  
  
  
  
  
  
“Oh-chan!” says the busker as Ohno shuffles nervously over to his side of the corridor. “Right on time!”  
  
“Hi,” says Ohno, torn between correcting that gross nickname the busker has just given him and asking how he knew when “right on time” was.  
  
“I thought about this a lot,” the busker says, speaking with warm familiarity as he starts to pack up his guitar. “And I think you’ll agree that the only way we can settle this fairly if for you to buy me lunch.”  
  
“Eh?” says Ohno, but the busker is already standing up, shoving his guitar case into Ohno’s hands so he can brush off the back of his fashionably tight jeans.  
  
Ohno doesn’t realize he’s staring until the busker gives an intrigued sounding hum. He looks back up and the busker has a sly sort of smile on his face. It makes Ohno’s stomach do a happy little flip.  
  
“Why do I have to buy you lunch?” he asks.  
  
“As payment,” the busker says easily. “For services rendered.”  
  
Ohno furrows his brow. That doesn’t sound right at all. But then the busker starts to laugh, and it sounds like the yip of a carefree puppy, and Ohno decides he kind of wants to take him to lunch anyway, even if it doesn’t make any sense.  
  
“Okay,” he agrees, handing the busker his guitar back.  
  
He starts towards the soba shop when he feels a tug on his arm. When he turns back, the busker curls his fingers more tightly around Ohno’s elbow and shakes his head.  
  
“I don’t like soba,” he says. “Let’s get hamburger.”  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The busker’s name is Nino. He’s three years younger than Ohno and he’s been playing guitar since he was eight. He likes hamburger, but he doesn’t eat much and ends up shoving most of his food onto Ohno’s plate. The baseball logo on his hat is for the Giants, his favorite team. When he laughs, he sometimes hides his face in his hands, or in the crook of his elbow, like he’s really feeling shy.  
  
He writes music. He doesn’t really like Taylor Swift that much, but on a whim one day, he thought it would be funny to learn her entire musical catalog and play only that. It was a joke, he says, until he started making twice as much money as he used to playing his own stuff.  
  
As promised, he makes Ohno pay for lunch. He even makes a show of patting himself down, to show he has no wallet, no money on him anyway.  
  
By the time the check comes, Ohno is completely in love with him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
It’s been three weeks. Ohno’s wallet is always empty now, and he’s been late getting back to work so many times lately that his boss has given up on scolding him.  
  
Nino’s apartment is surprisingly nice for a busker, in a well-kept neighborhood, with a buzzer to get into the building. Ohno would be impressed, if he wasn’t so busy wondering if Nino is going to kiss him.  
  
When they get into the elevator, he doesn’t have to wonder anymore. Nino is giggling against his lips, singing softly,  
  
_And you stood there in front of me just  
Close enough to touch  
Close enough to hope you couldn't see  
What I was thinking of_  
  
Ohno still can’t understand any of the words, but he doesn’t have to.  
  
Nino kisses him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Nino tastes a lot like hamburger, and something sort of sweet, maybe the milk bun he’d bullied Ohno into buying him on the way here. He’s a really good kisser, but Ohno thinks he wouldn’t care even if he was a terrible kisser. When he tells Nino this, Nino catches his laugh in the back of his palm, feeling shy.  
  
There’s a song stuck in Ohno’s head again. Nino sang it yesterday, in the station, when he thought Ohno had already left.  
  
_But can you feel this magic in the air?_  
_It must have been the way you kissed me_  
_Fell in love when I saw you standing there_  
  
Nino keeps pretending he doesn’t like Taylor Swift, but Ohno is starting to think he’s being shy about that too. He says so, later, and Nino is quick to point out that it’s Ohno who has all her albums, organized by color on his bedside table.  
  
Ohno can't argue with that, so instead he kisses him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Sho sends him a mail. It’s about a month late, but Sho is always late these days and Ohno doesn’t mind.  
  
_How did you like the soba shop?_  
  
Ohno opens up a reply message. In the bed beside him, Nino mumbles something, still half-asleep.  Ohno can’t really make it out, but he thought it sounded suspiciously like the lyrics to Taylor Swift’s new single, the one that Nino has been working on memorizing all week.  
  
_It was like a fairytale,_ he types and hits send.  
  
“That’s wrong,” Nino murmurs around a yawn. “It’s, _Today was a fairytale, It must have been the way, Today was a fairytale.”_  
  
“Ah,” says Ohno. “I got it wrong.”  
  
“Mm,” Nino hums and then he’s pushing up on his elbows and his eyes are still mostly closed, but Ohno leans in and kisses him anyway.  
  
“I would have gone with ‘Everything has Changed,’” says Nino, slumping back into Ohno’s pillow like a satisfied cat.  
  
“How does that one go again?” Ohno asks, even though he already knows. He catches Nino singing it in the shower almost every day.  
  
_Cause all I know is we said, "Hello."_  
_And your eyes look like coming home_  
_All I know is a simple name_  
_Everything has changed_  
  
“Hmm, that is pretty good,” Ohno agrees when Nino stops singing in his softest, sweetest voice – the one he never uses when he’s busking. “Should I mail him again?”  
  
Nino laughs, and buries his face in the pillow.  
  
_Everything has changed_ , Ohno types to Sho.  
  
Before he can put his phone down, it pings with a new message, the screen lighting up with Sho’s name.  
  
_Are you quoting Taylor Swift songs?????_  
  
Ohno didn’t know Sho was such a fan.


End file.
